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Resources
Resources Usually Resources is a measure of your available wealth, but the specific form this takes—from a secret family silver mine to a well-invested portfolio—can vary from character to character (and may be indicated and enhanced by your aspects). Characters with high Resources can buy their way into or out of most situations and can easily afford the finest luxuries of life. They include aristocrats, successful criminals, and businessmen. It’s important to note that Resources represents your personal resources, including your regular forms of income, whether your job is “steady” or not. You may have access to an organization’s resources under certain circumstances; this allows you to roll a different rating than your personal Resources skill. Rolling that way means you’re expending that organization’s resources, not your own. For example, a consultant for Monoc Securities might decide to acquire a private jet for corporate use. The consultant’s Resources might only be Fair (+2), but in this case the consultant rolls using Monoc’s expense account, rated at Fantastic (+6). Buying Things Usually, this skill passively informs the GM what your available resources are, but you may still actively roll Resources for large expenditures or expenses outside of the daily cost of living—like purchases and bribes. The cost of items is measured on the adjective ladder; you can buy reasonable quantities of anything that’s two steps or more lower than your Resources without worrying about it (i.e., not rolling). With justification, you can probably also get things one step below your Resources. For items greater than or equal to your Resources, roll against the cost of the thing. If successful, you can afford the item; if not, you can’t. You can only make one Resources roll per scene. '' ''Some large-scale conflicts may be all about trying to outspend the other guy. Here, Resources might act as an attack or defense skill. '' '' Equipment You are generally assumed to have all the tools you normally need to do your job, whether that job is fixing engines or shooting people. Still, sometimes a situation arises where you need to buy something, either because you didn’t anticipate needing it or because the item is unusual, rare, or illegal. When that happens, measure the price in terms of how much Resources it requires to access and purchase the item. '' '' '' 'Lifestyle' ''You are assumed to live in accordance with your means. If you’re rich, you may not even need to go shopping (you have people who do that). Generally speaking, if something costs two steps less than your Resources skill, you probably have one already, assuming it’s something that would make sense for you to have obtained previously. '' '' '' 'Money Talks' ''Wealth puts pressure on social interaction, either subtly or overtly. On the subtle level, whenever knowledge of your wealth affects a situation, the Resources skill may be used to modify the actual skill being used (usually a social one). If being less wealthy is actually seen as a positive in the situation (perhaps to gain some “street cred” or what-have-you), then the rules for modifying may be turned around, creating a –1 to the roll if Resources is above a particular level. '' ''More overtly, you may use Resources as the primary skill in a social interaction where an offer of money is the primary factor. Bribery is the clearest of such cases here, though negotiations to get a cash-strapped wizard-for-hire to sign on to a case may involve a Resources roll, as well. '' '' '' 'Workspaces' ''Part of the passive measure of Resources is the personal tools and spaces you have access to. Workspaces are environments where you can perform a certain type of work, and owning and maintaining a world-class workshop, library, or arcane laboratory requires a certain amount of Resources. '' ''You use your Resources to set up the tools you need for your job. Your home may have, for free, a single library, lab, workshop, or arcane library or sanctum of a quality equal to two steps lower than your Resources. As described in 'Scholarship, the quality of a workplace determines the highest possible difficulty of a “question” or project that you can pursue there. '' The breakdown of the various types of skills that need workspaces is shown in the following table. See the respective skills for more details. If you wish to have a specialized workspace, such as a workshop that can only work on guns, you may have it at a quality equal to one step lower than your Resources instead. Higher quality workspaces may be constructed, but they require a Resources roll with a difficulty equal to the quality+2 (or +1 in the case of a specialized space) and are not immediately available at the time of purchase (though additional shifts may be spent to reduce the timeframe, as usual). Keep in mind that a library doesn’t have to be an actual, literal library full of books—any kind of archived, searchable information can be considered a library for game purposes. So, if you want to have something like a computer mainframe or set of hard drives that holds scanned documents on various topics, you could also consider that a library. Many actual libraries even have large computerized databases now, as opposed to older archival technologies like microfiche. '' ''By default, the Internet is a Mediocre library—extremely detailed information on a specialized topic is usually access-restricted or buried among useless and speculative information. If you want to, however, you can say that your library consists of access to specialized online databases (like Lexis-Nexis for lawyers) that would allow a higher quality rating. '' Also see 'Scholarship, Craftsmanship and Lore.